Gaming devices such as slot machines generate more than $15 billion in revenue per year for U.S. casinos. In fact, most casinos generate more than half of their gaming revenue from gaming devices such as slot machines. To take advantage of the popularity of slot machines and other gaming devices, some casinos offer three or four thousand slot machines in a single location.
Players of gaming devices can be important customers for casinos and other merchants in many respects. For instance, a person at a slot machine may not only provide a casino with gambling revenue, but may later pay to eat at the casino's restaurant, stay at the casino's hotel, or see a show at the casino. Furthermore, players of slot machines tend to represent a large cross section of the population, and therefore may be potential customers for phone companies, life insurance companies, car companies, and various other types of merchants.
Further value may be realized from players of gaming devices. For example, events occurring at a gaming device, such as events associated with a player of the gaming device, can provide the casino and other merchants with valuable indications as to what types of promotions and marketing offers would be most effective with that player. However, many gaming devices are not programmed or equipped to detect, transmit indications of, and/or record all events that may be of interest for such purposes. And manufacturers of new gaming devices or proprietors of networks on which the gaming devices are located may not necessarily have the interest or resources available to make the new gaming devices operable to detect, transmit indications of, and/or record such events. Additionally, regulators of gaming devices may be reluctant to allow significant changes or intrusive access to the information of a gaming device. Accordingly, a need exists for a manner of deriving various valuable information from a gaming device without requiring significant cooperation of a gaming device manufacturer, a proprietor of a network on which the gaming device is located, and/or regulators of the gaming device.